I think it's more about redefining what the "ultimate good" is. The reason why evolution seems to have been reversed or at least disrupted in the human species is because someone decided at one point that no one should die, thus creating a niche for lesser fit individuals to flourish and unfortunately to propagate.

Genocide serves to kill people based on their ethnicity, which you might argue is directly linked to their genotype, however I believe that is much too shallow and unfruitful since we know that true eugenics is a lot more skin deep.

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Life consists not in holding good cards but in playing those you hold well.- Josh Billings

Genocide serves to kill people based on their ethnicity, which you might argue is directly linked to their genotype, however I believe that is much too shallow and unfruitful since we know that true eugenics is a lot more skin deep.

I do not promote genocide, I think it is ridiculous that a discussion is developing around it. We are Satanists, we are true individuals, surely no-one here agrees that genocide could possibly be a good thing.

As for Eugenics, I do not have a solid position on it. This is not because I am not interested but because I find it hard to decide what is 'morally' right in this situation. I do agree with positive Eugenics, I am undecided on negative Eugenics (or at least to what extent this could be implemented), although I am very interested to see what does happen, if anything.

Well the goal of eugenics is to steer evolution towards a certain direction and that in my opinion would be best served by promoting reproduction among the fittest of individuals while preventing as much as possible the reproduction of the least fit.

I too find it odd that so much attention has been given to genocide as a possible solution, I mean who the hell is gonna bury all of those corpses??

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Life consists not in holding good cards but in playing those you hold well.- Josh Billings

Based on the assumption positive eugenics would simply end up reinforcing the trend natural selection stands for, no need for compulsory measures would be ever required, would they?

Ideally, they wouldn't. But realistically, they would.

Looking toward the betterment of the species as a whole or even just of your own offspring requires long term thinking. The intelligent and conscientious will do this anyway, but it's not their offspring a positive eugenics program would be seeking to avoid.

I can look to my extended family on my mother's side for examples not entirely based on the desire for more welfare funds to squander. The crackhead who wanted to hold on to her husband and figured yet another baby would be the trick. (That baby is now almost a teen and has spent most of his life bounced from foster family to foster family when not living with one or the other of his incompetent drug-addled parents. He's a bottomless pit for attention, and a know-it-all moron just like his father. Give him a few years, he'll be exactly the same as his parents, drugs and all.) The random cousins who party, get high, and later find they're pregnant because since when do drunks remember their pill or a rubber? Etc. I have cousins back east I've never heard of, and when I do hear about them, they're usually my age or younger and they've already had drug problems and children.

These people are either too stupid or too self-centered on short term thinking to go along with any sort of voluntary eugenics. Judging from the news, they're not the only nitwits around that are breeding. Some compulsory sterilization would be necessary.

I wonder if it might work to pay them for getting sterilized? Money usually is a bigger enticement for these types than ideals.

I've been reading a book by neurologist Alice W. Flaherty called The Midnight Disease: The Drive to Write, Writer's Block, and the Creative Brain and was struck this afternoon by the following passage in the chapter dedicated to links between creativity and mental illness:

Quote:

As I have mentioned, though, the people who are the most creative - or at least productive - are not the mentally ill but their close relatives. Researchers think that most mental illnesses are caused by multiple genes and that close relatives have some, but not all, of those genes. One explanation of why those genes have persisted through the ages, and do not get bred out of the population, is that they may give some advantage - perhaps creativity - to people who have a smaller number of them - even if a larger number cause the disease.

Clear examples of such genes exist outside of neuroscience. The sickle cell gene, for instance, protects its bearer against malaria but causes anemia. People who have only one copy of it have only a mild anemia and, if they live in an area where malaria is common, are at great advantage. Having two copies of the gene, however, produces a devastating anemia. A similar but more multifactorial pattern of inheritance may explain the persistence of genes that cause manic-depression and perhaps unipolar depression.

It's an interesting problem - if negative eugenics were pursued, where to draw the line between what might be mild mental illness that actually contributes to society through culture and art and more severe mental illness that might result in events like yesterday's massacre? This would especially be problematic if said eugenics program was done through selective abortion and genetic tests since we don't fully know what the whole genetic balance is yet.

(Not that I'm necessarily in favor of negative eugenics - my family's nutty and I have had bouts with unipolar depression in the past decade but I'm glad I'm here.)

It could also bring issues for positive eugenics in the sense of trying to select for more artistic ability could result in an overabundance of the genes in question leading to more severe mental illness.

It's funny how, in the space of one sentence, you manage to hit on the main problem that sits behind every single recurring problem on the planet; whether it be psychological, sociological, biological or otherwise.

People are intent on dealing with the effects as opposed to the cause.

That should be a bumper sticker on the back of every soccer-mom's van!

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ï¿½Love is one of the most intense feelings felt by man; another is hate. Forcing yourself to feel indiscriminate love is very unnatural. If you try to love everyone you only lessen your feelings for those who deserve your love. Repressed hatred can lead to many physical and emotional aliments. By learning to release your hatred towards those who deserve it, you cleanse yourself of these malignant emotions and need not take your pent-up hatred out on your loved ones.ï¿½ Anton Szandor LaVey, The Satanic Bible